I've failed!

Last night I went to my first improv class in San Francisco. There are 13 of us in class and it seems like a good group though I think at least one guy might be homeless. (If there were a place in the world where homeless people signed up to take improv classes, it would be San Francisco.)

About halfway through the three-hour class, the teacher stopped us abruptly in the middle of an exercise and directed us all to step one foot forward, throw our arms up overhead as though doing a circus performer's bow and loudly proclaim: "I've failed!"

We did this several times before she was satisfied.

You see, she explained, it is not that we are failures (except maybe for the homeless guy), but rather that good improv requires a level of risk-taking at which failure is inextricable from success; we embrace failure because that is how we know we are working at our creative edge.

I like how Keith Johnstone put it in our assigned reading:
"There are people who prefer to say 'Yes' and people who prefer to say 'No.' Those who say 'Yes' are rewarded by the adventures they have. Those who say 'No' are rewarded with the safety they attain."

I say Yes! I've failed! And I will fail again! Next week in improv class, if not sooner.